Iranian director Dariush Mehrjui and his wife were stabbed to death in their home by an unknown person, the country’s state press reported this Sunday.
Iran’s official IRNA news agency said, citing judicial official Hossein Fazeli, that Mehrjui and his wife, Vahideh Mohammadifar, were found dead with stab wounds to the neck.
Fazeli said the director’s daughter, Mona Mehrjui, found the bodies when she went to visit her parents on Saturday night at their home in a suburb about 30 kilometers west of Tehran.
Authorities are investigating and have not provided a motive, although the director’s wife had reported a threat on social media in recent weeks.
Mehrjui, 83, was known as a co-founder of the new wave of Iranian cinema of the early 1970s, which focused primarily on realism.
He has received numerous awards, including a Silver Hugo at the Chicago International Film Festival in 1998 and a Golden Shell at the San Sebastián International Film Festival in 1993.
Mehrjui studied film at the University of California, Los Angeles, in the early 1960s.
Source: TSF
